Photoshop Tutorial for Fashion Design (Part 6)
Tools: Brushes, Stamp, History, Healing

With Brush tools you can paint freehand brush strokes of various shapes, sizes and textures which you can preset in the option bar. You can choose the desired brush type from the drop-down menu, adjust its hardness and size. You can also select different modes. We’ll stay with Normal. You can change the opacity. Anything below 100% will make the brush look transparent.

To change your cursor appearance to look more like a brush, go to Photoshop Preferences, click “Cursors” and set it to the “Full Size Brush Tip”. Now my cursor looks exactly like my brush.

The Pencil tool, located below the Brush, allows you to draw freehand hard edged lines. And just like Brush, it comes in different shapes, sizes and textures and shares the same options.

Color Replacement tool allows you to recolor artwork using freehand brush strokes. And it preserves image texture. Being from the brush family, it shares brush settings and brush modes. But it also has Magic Wand tolerance and anti-alias. In addition, the Color Replacement tool has a few options of its own. The first one is “Continuous Sampling”. It samples the color to replace as I’m painting. The second option is “Sample Once”. It samples the color to replace first time I press my mouse button and as I continue dragging the cursor over my artwork it only replaces the color initially sampled. Make sure you click and drag your cursor without releasing the mouse. To resample, simply release the mouse and start again. And the final option is “Sampling Background Swatch”. It only replaces the color set as your background.

Right below the brushes is another member of the brush family: Clone Stamp tool. It enables you to copy your artwork using freehand brushes. First, holding the Option key [ALT key in Windows] click to sample the area you want to set as your starting point. Then click and drag the cursor in the area you want the copy to appear. You can even clone the source into a different document. As I’m using the tool I have two cursors on the screen. One is my actual brush and the second cursor is at the source of the clone.

Hidden beneath the Clone Stamp tool is the Pattern Stamp tool. The Pattern Stamp tool allows you to paint with patterns that you can choose in the option bar. Set your brush type and size and then simply click and drag in your document. The Align option allows you to paint with your pattern seamlessly. And you can use the Opacity if you want your patterns to appear transparent.

Below the Stamp tools in the tools palette are History Brushes. But before we can work with them, we need to set the source using the History palette docked to the right side of the screen. The History palette records and lists as a state each change made to a document. We’ll go over it in more details in the Palette segment. For now, I’m only going to use it for the History brush. To set the source, choose one of the previous states from the list. I will go back before the time I used Healing brushes. Then click on the section on the left side of the listed state to activate. The History brush icon will appear. When you set your source simply click and drag the cursor over the desired area. And as you paint, History brush restores the image to the previous state.

Art History brush also uses History palette as a source and restores your image but in the artsy kind of way. As a fashion designer, I never really found a practical application for them but they’re sure fun to play with. If you’re into textiles or just feeling creative you can always use these brushes for your portfolio.

The Healing brushes were created to correct damaged areas. Let’s say, for example, I have a green spot on my rose. To correct it, I’m going to choose Spot Healing Brush tool and simply click on the damaged area. It is very similar to cloning tools: first it samples neighboring areas and then applies the same texture to the spot I clicked on. Being from the brush family, it has similar options like brushes presets and modes.

The Healing Brush tool is very similar to the Clone Stamp tool. Holding the Option [ALT] key on your keyboard click and release the mouse to set the starting point of your source. Then paint over the desired area. As opposed to the Clone Stamp tool that creates an identical copy, the Healing Brush blends the clone with its new environment when you release the mouse. In addition to cloning, the Healing Brush allows you to set a pattern as your source. To use this option you don’t need to do any sampling. Simply click and drag your cursor to paint over the desired area. And when you release the mouse, the Healing Brush will blend the pattern with the environment.

The Patch tool, just like the Healing Brush, copies the source and blends it with the new environment but instead of freehand brush stroke it uses freehand selection. And just like with any other selection tool, you can add to the selection and subtract from the selection.

There are two ways you can use the Patch tool. You can set it as a Source, which will allow you to clone into the selection. Click and drag your selection to the area you want to be cloned. As I’m dragging the selection, you can see how the image is changing in the original location. Release the mouse when you’re happy with the source of your clone. And just like the Healing Brush, the Patch tool will blend a copy into the environment.

The second option is the Destination. With this setting, you will use the selected area to make a copy. Click and drag the selected area to the desired destination and release the mouse. The Patch tool will blend the copy into the environment. And finally, just like with any other healing tool you can set a pattern as your source. Select a pattern from the option bar and click on “Use Pattern” to apply.